Hi everybody, Melissa.
Thank you so much for watching CloudMom.
Today I'm answering a question from Nikki, here's what she says.
I'm reading from my laptop here guys.
"Hi, my name is Nicole.
I've been having a hard time getting my milk supply back.
I have been nursing for four months, those four months after I nursed him, I always give
him formula because he's not full.
Then, after that I decided to pump to see how much I get during the morning hours and
I usually get four ounces.
But then during the daytime I get very little.
I want to be able to nurse only and I want to have more milk for him.
Nikki, these are great questions.
When it comes to nursing, I adapt the mantra of Winston Churchill and it is, "never give
up".
I'm going to suggest three things that really helped me and I did have a lot of ups and
downs with my own milk supply through breastfeeding five babies over seven years, and went up
and down.
I'm going to suggest three things and hopefully they will be helpful to you.
Number one: focus on you, on your diet, on rest, and on supplements.
You want to get as much healthy food into your system as possible.
I drank a lot of milk; if you can drink milk, drink it.
Drink water, plenty of fluids, healthy fruits and vegetables, whole grains, try to stay
away from the junk food, just eat things that are really going to give your body lots of
nutrients.
Rest, it's very hard with young babies because we're up so much during the night.
The old mantra "sleep when the baby sleeps" is a really good one.
Try to get an extra nap in, particularly during the morning when your baby goes back to sleep,
and try to make sure that you are staying well rested.
A lot of people also swear by fenugreek.
I've got another video on that that I'm going to link to, so give that a try.
Number two: during the process of nursing, what happens is that when you first start
to nurse your body produces a thinner milk and over time it produces a thicker more nutritious
milk, also called the hindmilk.
You want to get your baby as much of that hindmilk as possible and that means that you
want to keep nursing from each side until that breast feels empty before going to the
other side.
Each time you nurse, start with a different breast.
Some people put like a little paper clip or some little thing on their shirt so that they
remember where they started the last time and that will help you not favor one breast
over the other.
Once you're finished nursing, if you still are getting the feeling that your baby wants
more milk and both breasts are empty, at that point by all means give your baby some formula.
And here's the biggest tip which really changed my entire breastfeeding life, which I started
to do by around baby number three.
After every time you nurse, even if you feel that you have no milk left, put the pump on
both breasts with a hands-free bra for just five to ten minutes or so, you can do it while
you're giving the baby his formula, you can do it while you're burping the baby.
Now, are you going to get big bags of milk at this point?
No.
You might even get an ounce, less than an ounce, but what this is doing is it's telling
your body, continue to produce milk.
So basically you're encouraging your body to continue to produce milk and this is great
for your milk production.
If you do this in the morning and then after every time you nurse, I guarantee you that
by the end of the day you will have a nice bag of milk whether it be four ounces or five
or six, and you can put that in the freezer and it's like insurance because the next time
if ever you need to skip a feeding, you've got that milk there, handy and ready to go.
That is liquid gold.
So I think these three tips are really going to help you, I know they really, really helped
me.
Hang in there; milk supply goes up and down.
Some people have this feeling that people can just, women can dry up and that the milk
can never come back, not true!
I had points where I felt that my milk was really low, and by following these three tips,
oh I just thought of one other thing I should have put in the video, this is really important.
The sheer physical proximity of the baby, holding the baby, will encourage you to have
a letdown and to produce more milk.
So you basically want to be with your baby, holding your baby, hugging your baby, having
your baby in a bjorn, as much as possible.
I even noticed when I went back to work in an office that the more I was away from the
baby, the less milk that I produced, and then when I would spend the weekend with the baby,
on Monday I would be in better shape.
So anyway, I hope these tips are helpful, keep up the great work.
Don't give up!
Thank you so much for writing in, let me know if you have other questions and I will see
you next time.